Wei Guoying, a former head
nurse at a Guangzhou hospital, was sentenced to two years in prison with a
three-year reprieve for negligence in the death of Sun Zhigang last
March, the Southern Metropolitan News reported Tuesday.

The portrait of Sun
Zhigang, who has lost his young life at a repatriation center in
Guangzhou last March [baidu]

Wei, 40, was
the last person to be tried over the death which resulted in a change to the law
last year.

Sun Zhigang, 27, a graphic designer from Hubei Province, was treated as a
vagrant and detained in a repatriation center in Guangzhou in March last year
when he could not show his temporary residence card and identification
card.

After claiming he had heart disease, Sun was sent to a branch of the
Guangzhou Hospital for Cerebral Diseases, where Wei worked as head nurse.

He was found dead a few days later and an investigation found he had been
beaten to death by inmates at the instigation of a nursing assistant, Qiao
Yanqing.

In June 2004, Qiao was sentenced to death for playing a leading role in Sun's
death and one of the inmates was given a suspended death sentence.

Ten other inmates received sentences of up to life imprisonment for their
parts in the homicide, while another six people, including a policeman, a senior
official of the repatriation center and four medical workers at the hospital,
were given prison terms of two to three years for neglecting their duties.

Procurators had been arguing about Wei's role in the case and suspended her
trial until this week, the paper said.

Sun's case has partially led to the State Council rescinding a regulation
which was introduced in 1982 allowing police to detain people who failed to
produce local residence permits.